As Nigeria continues to record more coronavirus infections, the direct adverse impact has been more fatalities.

A total of 112,004 infections have now been reported across the nation with 1,617 new cases, the second highest daily tally, found in 18 states on Monday.

Also on Monday, 14 people died from the disease raising the total fatality toll to 1,449, according to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC).

In the previous 24 hours, Nigeria reported one of it’s deadliest day of the pandemic with 15 people dying from the disease on Sunday.

This is coming a few days after the global coronavirus death toll surpassed two million.

As countries begin to roll out the COVID-19, experts anticipate there will be a reduction in mortality but there have been more deaths especially in countries where the second wave of the virus is spreading unrestrained.

In the past four weeks, there have been over 200 fatalities as a result of COVID-19 complications in Nigeria.

The rise in mortality shows that the second wave of the pandemic is deadlier than the first as more patients are symptomatic and require breathing support.

“The reason for rise in fatalities is not far-fetched. When there are is a sharp rise in new cases, there will definitely be more deaths”, said Chikwe Ihekweazu, head of the NCDC.

Active cases in the country rose sharply from about 3,000 about two months ago to over 20,000 due to a rise in new infections.

Of the over 112,000 cases so far, 89,939 patients have been discharged from hospitals after treatment.

Specifics
The 1, 617 new cases were reported from the following 18 states: Lagos-776
Kaduna-147
Kwara-131
FCT-102
Plateau-78
Edo-59
Ogun-53
Osun-45
Rivers-37
Taraba-36
Nasarawa-34
Adamawa-33
Kano-26
Delta-20
Ebonyi-16
Bayelsa-11
Gombe-11
Borno-2

Lagos, again, led with 776 new cases on Monday, nearly half of the daily total. The commercial city is Nigeria’s coronavirus epicentre with a total of over 40,000 confirmed cases and over 270 deaths.

The Minister of State for Health, Mr Mamora, warned Nigerians against complacency in containing the COVID-19 pandemic as the much-awaited vaccines may not arrive the country as soon as expected.

The government said it is expecting to start receiving vaccines for the disease by the end of the month but many global experts and bodies told PREMIUM TIMES that that is “almost likely impossible”.

So far, Nigeria has conducted over 1.1 million COVID-19 tests.